2002-11-25 - 2:39 p.m.

The never-ending entry about one hell of a weekend.

Oh, so much to say. I've been very busy. Hence the not updating. And, fair warning, this is likely to be the last update of the week, as tomorrow Mom and the sisters and bros-in-law and I are heading to Vegas for Thanksgiving.

Vegas baby, Vegas.

Let's begin with Friday night. Did the show. I thought it was a good show. Herr Director came down on us again for it not being a good show. Which is really kinda starting to piss me off. Cause, it's not like we're slouches. We're doing a pretty good job. He's just hyper-critical these days because of money concerns. But that's not my fault, or even really my issue. If they would just bite the bullet and invest in some halfway decent marketing, instead of expecting us to do our job (which is acting, not marketing, and which is also completely unpaid, I'd like to point out) and then maybe if they did their job (which is getting butts in seats) we'd all be happier. Anyway, I'm getting all ranty here, and I didn't mean to. Denial, who was in the last show, and since moved to California, was back in town for a visit and saw the show. It was really nice to see him, and to get his feedback on the show (positive).

Saturday was a day-long calorie-fest. First I got up and went to a surprise birthday brunch for Mom. BigSis had contacted a bunch of Mom's friends and family, and had them write something for the occasion of her 60th b-day, and include some photos. She then put it all together into an album for Mom. Which was really cool, and made Mom cry.

From brunch, I went over to Friendsgiving at BoBoGirl's place. Which was a real hoot. There was a ton of really good food (the whole turkey, mashed taters, cranberry slime dinner thing) and a ton of good friends. ShyGirl was there, and we alternated between mild awkwardness and getting along very well.

From Friendsgiving I went to dinner with Dad and the fam. Which was our Thanksgiving dinner with Dad, since we'll be in Vegas. (Vegas baby, Vegas) Having done nothing but eat for the previous eight hours, I just had a side salad, which I couldn't even finish.

From dinner I went to do the show. We had a sell out. Literally every seat filled. It was a great show. Honestly we stepped up to the occasion. Of course, it turns out that almost a third of the audience was my friends and family. See, BigSis has been threatening for six months to do something big and embarrassing for my 30th birthday (which was in May). So finally what she did was get everyone she could identify as my friend to show up to this one show. So after the curtain call, she had about thirty of my friends and family holding up signs and yelling and screaming. It was very embarrassing, and very touching, and just great. I love my sisters more than I could ever say, you know?

After that we had a huge crowd go out to our local watering hole. ShyGirl, who hadn't come to the show, but for some reason (which I never got out of her) showed up after the show, came and hung out with me and my friends and fam. It was an awkward situation for her, and I know it, but I was glad that she got to meet everyone, and I was glad to spend more time with her. There were, of course, many enquiring glances thrown at me, and many assumptions made. But also, people just seemed to like her, which is good.

Once the fam left, ShyGirl and I went over to join the rest of the CowPlace crowd. I kind of blew it then. Cause, see, I've been trying not to let people know that I like her. I've been trying to keep things under my hat. Which is dumb. Cause all my emotions are always visible on my face. I can't hide shit. And I know that, and I still try to. Hence the dumb. Also, it meant that ShyGirl, even though she was surrounded by folks that she knew, felt a little abandoned by me. Cause, we'd been acting very couple-ish all day, and then suddenly I was very much in the "we're just friends" thing. So it was inconsiderate of me, though in my defense, I didn't realize the extent to which it would bug her.

Anyway, she became upset, and wanted to just go home, and so I took off to drive her home. And we had a very long, and frank talk. Because things are weird. We've been trying this thing where we're just friends, but it's obvious that there might be something more, but we're not sure, and maybe there's spark and maybe there's not, and she's trying this whole casual dating thing, which I'm not good at, and I don't even think we should be dating, because she's *so* not over her ex, and there was this thing where hanging with my fam made her miss her ex's fam, and so she's not in a place to be dating seriously, and I knew that, which is why I was trying to do the friends thing, but neither of us want to be stuck in the Friend Zone, but I have all this fear about dating her, because I don't want to get hurt, or to hurt her, or to be the rebound guy, and it should be obvious by now that I'm so terribly confused, and finally we decided that we'd been out on too many not-dates, that were almost dates, and we can't do this "let's not define it" thing, so we either have to decide to be friends, or we should go out on a real date, and see what happens, and we recognize that we're both over-analyzing, but at least we're talking and talking honestly, and in any case, we're going out on a real honest to goodness date tonight, and all that nervousness I had before our first not-date, well, that's all back with a vengeance, and this sentence is now approaching Faulkner length so I'll move on to Sunday.

Sunday was our second day of shooting on the independent film. We'd had some problems with the sound recorder last week, so we had to re-shoot some stuff. There are no big stories to tell. We just shot from noon to seven (and actually when I left, they were doing a couple more shots with two of the actors, and then were planning on doing cut in shots of inanimate objects). The thing is that last week we mostly got to do nice long takes, where we worked our way into the tough (from an acting perspective) spots. Yesterday, we were doing close ups and hand-held shots. Which meant that a couple of times I'd sit there in my spot, while everyone around me is laughing and joking their normal way, and when I hear "action" I have to be crying. Which, let me tell you, is really fucking hard to do. I got there better than I would have guessed I could, but it was so draining. I mean, I was physically and emotionally exhausted at the end of it. Which, I guess, is good. It's like a football player who leaves it all on the field. If you have reserves left at the end, maybe you weren't trying hard enough.

I slept harder last night than I have in a long time. I slept ten hours, and was still tired when I got up. It was a long, weird, emotionally turbulent weekend.